


Lingering

by Winterstar



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Medical Procedures
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-28
Updated: 2010-05-28
Packaged: 2017-12-13 06:29:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/821116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Winterstar/pseuds/Winterstar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Episode tag to Evolution Part 2</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lingering

The leg wound was the least of his worries. He ground his teeth against the ache across his abdomen. Janet had promised to make this as fast as possible, that he should lay back and rest. She'd even suggested a sedative during the process, but he refused. Somehow the thought of being out of it while she was doing this made him more anxious.

He lay on the operating table staring up at the overhead lights, blinking at the after effects burning his retina. After the fiasco that was Nicaragua or Honduras or where ever it was, Daniel barely recalled the trek to the plane and the flight back to the States. Most of those moments were lost in a fevered delirium from the infection eating his leg and his burns. Janet found the bullet wound easily handled and treated. He had been up on crutches within 24 hours of returning to base. The burns were washed, disinfected and treated with antibiotics. All was well.

So why was he here now?

Closing his eyes, Daniel let a shudder suffer through him. This was not the way it was supposed to go. He was supposed to be fine; he was supposed to be healing. The device he and Bill had retrieved damned him, though. His exposure to the activated device had been brief and would not result in any long term addiction, from what Janet understood from her study of it. Unfortunately, it was not as sophisticated as a sarcophagus and while it healed, it healed indiscriminately. Not only had it hastened the healing of the burns and cuts scarring Daniel's abdomen, it also accelerated the growth of the bacteria imbedded in the tissues. Though Janet treated his wounds with the standard therapy, it turned out his wounds, the bacteria specifically, were anything but standard now.

The long and short of it was, according to Janet, the device caused some tissue necrosis due to prolonged exposure to super bacteria settling into his flesh and underlying supportive tissues. She had to go in and debride the wounds. In other words, she had to cut open each one, cut away the dead tissue, clean up any remaining superbugs in order to help promote healing of the underlying healthy tissue. There was a risk of loss of sensation, further infection, bleeding and pain. 

Of course, pain.

There was no way around the procedure. Round after round of antibiotics had taken care of the major driving infection, but there was still a lingering intermittent fever, nausea, the pain from the dying tissue and the fact that the wounds would not heal. The bugs had to be physically removed and the dead tissue had to be cleaned out.

Janet walked into the OR with a number of nurses and assistants behind her. She leaned over Daniel and said, "We're going to use a local anesthesia for now, but we may need to go to a general one if things get more complicated. The local will numb the area but I have to confess Daniel you will still feel pain and some discomfort."

He nodded, but didn't look directly at her.

She laid a hand on his shoulder. "You can ask for a sedative at any time. Doctor Hidle will be right here, watching your pain levels." She started to cover her face with the mask. Additionally, she put on a face shield since she would be exposed to the nasty bacteria festering in his wounds.

"Okay," Daniel said and turned to smile at the young man standing next to Janet.

"I'm going to strap you down now and we'll start an i.v. The i.v. will have fluid, some pain meds and some antibiotics to decrease risk of infection," Dr Hidle said.

"The pain meds won't make me sleepy, will they?" Daniel asked.

"No, they shouldn't. As I understand it, you asked for nothing more powerful than prescription ibuprofen?"

"Yes," Daniel said. He needed to know he could feel pain. He needed to know the lurking threat of an addiction was truly and utterly gone. When he realized what the device did, how it worked, he recalled feeling a rush, a thrill. It was that momentary thrill that led him to his escape plan; that even now, caused him to request a minimum of pain killers as he prepared for the arduous process of wound debridement.

"Daniel?" Janet said. "We're going to start in a few minutes. We'll put up the curtain to drape the area. You will be strapped down so that you cannot move during the procedure. If you need anything, just tell us. Okay?"

He gave her a smile that he did not feel. It was only minutes until the curtain was before his face and he couldn't see the area she would be working on. Hidle strapped down his arms in a cruciform style and started an i.v.. He felt Janet preparing the areas sterilizing first then the puncture of the needle as she numbed patches on his abdomen. She started to tell him about the latest Cassie gossip as she worked and he made the appropriate replies, yet his fear ratcheted up as she started.

At first, the discomfort only caused him to gulp for breath once or twice. The nurse closest to him patted him on the arm to calm him. It happened then in earnest and he groaned against the pain. He blinked as tears pool in his eyes and Janet asked him again to take a sedative.

"No," he whispered. He suppressed a moan as she dug deep into his wounds.

"Sorry, Daniel, we have a lot of infected areas that have been healed over with tissue." Janet pulled at his wound and he bit his lip. "It seems the device was more insidious than we thought. There are areas completely healed which have infected pools of bacteria. I have to open every one of your wounds, Daniel, including the gunshot wound."

He said nothing but squeezed his eyes closed as the sharp pains continued.

"Doctor Lee didn't have any of these issues," Janet noted.

"He didn't," Daniel started then stopped. He failed to stifle a moan but then forced words out, "After he told them about the device, he - he wasn't exposed to it. Only me, me."

"Lucky him," Janet said and added, "Daniel, I'm sorry. I really wish you would take a sedative, I don’t like the idea of torturing you."

"You’re not. Not your fa-." He couldn't finish as she proceeded with the debridement. It was getting more difficult to breath. The pull and tug at his skin and muscles, although the areas was numb, he could still feel the deep tissue probing and slicing into his flesh.

Hidle leaned over him."I need to give you something for the pain, something stronger."

"No, no," Daniel said and clawed at the edges of the winged table.

Janet placed a hand over his abdomen just above his navel. "Daniel, I need you to settle down a bit, just a bit. I can't do this without serious injury to the adjacent tissues if you are moving."

"Okay, okay," he said and nodded to Hidle. "Nothing strong. Not too strong."

"I'll see what I can do," Hidle promised. He fiddled with the i.v. line and injected it quickly and efficiently. "Tell me if this helps any?"

Janet began again. She stopped trying to distract him as she concentrated on the wounds. He heard words to terrify him 'pockets of infection', 'resistant bacteria', 'septic shock a possibility'.

The pain had dulled considerably. He stilled the beating fear in his heart, Daniel breathed easier as the procedure continued. He felt it before Janet announced it; her gentle hands on his leg.

"We're going to open up your leg wound now. We may need to put you under if this is more complicated than it looks, Daniel."

He felt the slight pinch of the needle as she numbed the area. It took a few more minutes and some questions regarding his sensations before Janet started to work on the bullet wound. He only felt pressure at first and Janet discussed the wound and how it healed. Her words were soothing and he let his eyelids droop as the pain meds allowed him to relax.

Janet gasped at the same time the pain seared through Daniel's leg. He cried out.

"Put him under, put him under!" Janet yelled.

"What? What?" Daniel managed to say through clenched teeth as he tried to hold back the screams.

It would be the first time Daniel ever heard Janet angry, very angry. "Damn it, I said put him under now."

Hidle’s hands shook as he pulled the mask over Daniel’s face. He tried to push it away, but he was tied down and couldn’t fight. The pain swirled around him as he gagged with nausea. 

“I’m going to have to intubate him.”

“Just do it,” Janet said.

“Janet?” Daniel whispered, but his words were hoarse and broken as the spears of pain jolted through his nerves. The anesthesiologist injected the i.v. line again and the room swam and faded around Daniel. 

“I’m sorry, Daniel, so sorry,” Janet said as he closed his eyes.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

His eyes felt stuck as if glue held them closed. He briefly considered if he was dead, but realized death didn't hurt so much. He coughed and a hand touched on his shoulder while a soft voice beckoned to him, "Come on, Daniel, wake up for good this time."

"Hmm?" Sand gritted in his eyes and he went to wipe them clean when he noticed the i.v. line taped to his hand, the nasal cannula wrapped on his face. "What? What happened?"

Janet stood over him. "Complications during the debridement. We had to put you under to do major surgery on your leg wound."

"What?" It felt like his mind took a great dip like the first hill of a rollercoaster. His leg was healing; had been fine.

"The wound healed over a massive infection, Daniel. It is no wonder you were suffering from a persistent fever. We had to physically clean the wound out of the super bacteria. It is still open, now." She eased him into a sitting position. His leg was balanced on firm cushions but the wound was open for him to see. She placed a sterile gauze over it. "We'll be cleaning it for the next 24 hours to try and remove any of the residual bacteria. Then we will consider if we can close it up."

"But when you did the surgery before?" It seemed surreal to him, to have this open wound, to start again with his bullet wound.

"When we did the surgery we had no idea about the super bugs. The device essentially caused the bugs in your system to gain resistance to the antibiotics we used. While the surface of the wound seemed fine," Janet said. "There was a deep muscle infection. Luckily we were able to save the muscle with minimal damage."

He wanted to ask how this could possibly be missed? How could the infection have taken hold without any indication, but he knew the answer. The device had mutated the bugs, had changed the bacteria to resurrection itself into a transformed, resistance strain.

"We believe it grows more slowly and thus the reason there was very little outward signs of infection." Janet held his hand. "I'm sorry, Daniel, this is my fault."

He shook his head. "It isn't anyone's fault."

"Except maybe the lunes that invented the damned thing in the first place," Jack said as he strode up to Daniel's bedside. "How do you feel?"

"Like I've been run over by a truck," Daniel confessed. Just the position of sitting caused the ache across the wounds on his abdomen to protest and he held an arm against his bandages.

"Wow, not 'fine'," Jack said. "That's a first."

"I figure that's a good thing," he said as he laid his head back into the cushions.

"Good thing?"

"Considering the device and all," Daniel answered. His limbs felt heavy, his mouth weak, his brain sluggish. "Good to feel bad."

"I guess," Jack said and sat down next to the bed.

"I'll leave you to it, then," Janet said. “If you need anything for the pain, just call us.” She left with her head bowed.

“It isn’t her fault,” Daniel said in a low voice. Jack turned to look where the doctor had disappeared.

“No one said it was,” Jack replied.

“She did, she thinks it was her fault,” he said and lifted his chin to indicate her. “That’s what she was saying when you came in.”

“Hey.” It was a few moments before Jack said, "You okay?"

He only nodded with his eyes closed.

“You sure?”

Daniel shrugged. “I was scared, Jack. I thought with the device and all.” He opened his hands but didn’t finish his thoughts.

“It wasn’t like that, Daniel. It wasn’t like the sarcophagus,” Jack said.

“Maybe,” Daniel leaned into the pillows. The shift caused the leg muscles to strain and he clenched his fists. After a deep breath he said, “Maybe not.”

“Daniel, just promise no more torturing yourself with weird ass surgical procedures." Jack said then added, "Fraiser told me all about it, how you insisted on no sedative or pain meds at the beginning."

“I promise.” He slitted his eyes open to focus on Jack. "I feel like crap and that, Jack is the best feeling in the world. Right now."

"Right now. This is good."

"Yes, good, yes."

"Okay."

"Jack."

"Daniel."

"Jack!"

"Just go to sleep."

He drifted off with the word 'Jack' on his lips.

THE END


End file.
